LITERARY CORNER: Rimbaud's "The First Evening"

She had very few clothes on

And big indiscreet trees

Threw their leaves against the panes

Slyly, very close, very close.

Sitting in my big chair,

Half naked, she clasped her hands.

Her small feet so delicate, so delicate,

Trembled with pleasure on the floor.

---The color of wax, I watched

A small nervous ray of light

Flutter in her smile

And on her breast---a fly on the rose-bush.

---I kissed her delicate ankles.

Abruptly she laughed.  It was soft

And it spread out in clear trills,

A lovely crystal laughter.

Her small feet under the petticoat

Escaped.  “Please stop!”

---When the first boldness was permitted,

The laugh pretended to punish!

---Poor things trembling under my lips,

I softly kissed her eyes:

---She threw her sentimental head

Backward: “Oh! that’s too much!...

“Sir, I have something to say to you…”

---What was left I put on her breast

In a kiss, which made her laugh

With a kind laugh that was willing…

---She had very few clothes on

And big indiscreet trees

Threw their leaves against the panes

Slyly, very close, very close.

                                   

                                    - Arthur Rimbaud

Rimbaud, Arthur.  Rimbaud: Complete Words, Selected Letters.  Trans. Wallace Fowlie.

            Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 1966. Print.